Digital literacy among EFL teachers: A systematic review
Keywords:
digital literacy, EFL teachers, professional developmentAbstract
Digital literacy as a competence of English as Foreign Language (EFL) teachers ABSTRACT This systematic literature review combines existing empirical evidence about digital literacy in the field, specifically EFL teachers, including current levels of competence, factors affecting them and their development and implementation challenges. This systematic review was guided by PRISMA, and involved searching for peer-reviewed articles published in Q1 or Q2 journals from 2021 to 2026 via Google Scholar. After a two-phase screening process, 34 studies were deemed eligible for inclusion. This study reveals that while EFL teachers have sufficient foundational digital literacy, transformative pedagogical integration remains considerably shallow and on average moderate-high but with considerable variation between pedagogy development forms. At least three of the top 10 most influential factors relate to institutional support, professional development, self-efficacy and infrastructure. While training programmes take effect in teaching practices, they are grounded on the same materialistic reality fixed by resource scarcity, attributing a major influence of pedagogy conservatism and contextual barriers. The review then makes a case for situated, contextualised professional development frameworks.
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